There is vs have

aly1010 · Post by **aly1010** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 12:44 am

My Chinese students often use 'have' instead of 'there is' in making description.

Eg. Instead of 'There is a toilet in the house.',
they write 'The house has a toilet.'

This is a direct translation from the Chinese language. Is this grammatically correct in English?

JuanTwoThree · Post by **JuanTwoThree** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 6:08 am

It's perfectly correct and in some cases sounds better (to me):

The house has a garden.

The house has a swimming pool.

Start these with "There is......" and it doesn't work so well.

metal56 · Post by **metal56** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 8:01 am

JuanTwoThree wrote:It's perfectly correct and in some cases sounds better (to me):

The house has a garden.

The house has a swimming pool.

Start these with "There is......" and it doesn't work so well.

Sounds like the register of estate agents.

JuanTwoThree · Post by **JuanTwoThree** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 8:52 am

Estate agents might even say "enjoys"!

Lorikeet · Post by **Lorikeet** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 3:25 pm

My Chinese students don't do that.

Instead of either, "There is a toilet in the house," or "The house has a toilet." they would tend to make the error, "There have a toilet in the house." I am surprised yours are doing it the right way.

aly1010 · Post by **aly1010** » Thu Mar 15, 2007 12:33 am

Thanks everyone.

yes, I do have students using "there have ... " too, mainly Chinese students.